Economic crime report 2004 - Ekobrottsmyndigheten

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Evasion of selective purchase tax Tax havens and tax evasion related to foreign financial markets Money laundering 3. Abuse of legal forms of business entity Spurious shelf company dealings Spurious founders of shelf companies 4. Insolvency-related offences 5. Organized crime 2.3 SOURCES OF INFORMATION The status report (1999:2) that EBM submitted in September 1999 as the basis for the Government’s 2000 interagency guidelines ventured an overall description of the various types of economic crime in Sweden. The report (2001:1) submitted in August 2001 argued that methods of committing these offences had not changed significantly. Although most agency officials involved in combating economic crime appeared willing to sign off on such an assertion, it should be taken with a grain of salt. Important to keep in mind is the way in which information about the types and scope of economic crime is spread. In the first place, such offences committed against the public sector are of a totally different character than traditional or economic crime whose victims are businesses, organizations or private individuals. When the public sector is the target, no individual suffers direct injury or loss. Only after a public official has taken some kind of monitoring measure – or an individual, business or organization has filed a report – are such offences detected. A much greater proportion of economic crimes committed against the public sector undoubtedly go unreported than is the case with those aimed at other victims. Nevertheless, various studies have shown that a relatively large percentage of such offences suffered by others than the public sector are also unreported, albeit not for the same reasons. For instance, businesses refrain from submitting reports for fear of losing their standing with customers, while financial institutions don’t want to let on that their monitoring procedures are inadequate. An assessment of overall economic crime trends during a particular period of time must examine, in addition to unreported cases, the ways in which 8
detected offences are documented, as well as how such information is subsequently processed and compiled. Following are the characteristics of economic crime that are of greatest value for understanding its evolution from the point of view of efforts to combat it. • What punishable acts are involved? • How many such offences are committed? • How many people engage in economic crime? • What are their modes of operation? • What is the scope of the offences in money terms? • What are the sanctions? No Swedish agency involved in combating economic crime systematically documents all of these characteristics. The information that is documented is neither processed nor compiled. That makes it difficult to gain a more precise overview of even the detected offences. The methods for getting a sense of the types and scope of economic crime are the same now as in previous years. Such information is based on monitoring measures taken by various agencies as described in the SAMEB reports submitted each February, as well as the annual reports of the national agencies. Either singly or jointly, the agencies also carry out in-depth, short-term projects that examine particular economic offences and generate special reports. Interviews with individual officials of agencies that combat economic crime provide information, albeit ad hoc and unsystematic, about ongoing cases. Like the above projects, research can also shed light on particular aspects of certain economic offences carried out during a specified time period. Furthermore, coverage by the mass media offers some insight into how economic crime is committed. All in all, the prospects for providing a reliable account of the types, scope and trends of economic crime are currently unpropitious. The resulting deficit of knowledge hampers the effort to combat such offences at all levels: governmental needs of documentation for management, prioritization and legislation; measures taken by agencies; and reforms adopted by the private sector. 9
Page 1 and 2: ECONOMIC CRIME REPORT Report no. 20
Page 3 and 4: Economic Crime Report
Page 5 and 6: Government Swedish Ministry of Just
Page 7: Economic Crime and Efforts to Comba
Page 10 and 11: Economic Crime - Current Status and
Page 12 and 13: Economic Consequences of Economic C
Page 14 and 15: Interagency Cooperation Measures Th
Page 16 and 17: Undeclared Work • Employers who h
Page 18 and 19: A CLOSER LOOK AT UNDECLARED WORK, V
Page 20 and 21: VAT Fraud There is always a risk th
Page 22 and 23: Trends Over the Next Three Years Fo
Page 24 and 25: Concluding Remarks The purpose of t
Page 27 and 28: Contents 1. Introduction 6 2. Curre
Page 29 and 30: 10.5 NATIONAL CRIME PREVENTION PROJ
Page 31 and 32: Table 31 Number of decisions by oth
Page 33: 2. Current Status of Economic Crime
Page 37 and 38: sentative of both commercial goods
Page 39 and 40: mentary evidence for verifying actu
Page 41 and 42: SKV put together documentation to l
Page 43 and 44: that a certain volume of uncollecte
Page 45 and 46: Table 3 Estimated tax error linked
Page 47 and 48: The minimum tax rates on alcohol ar
Page 49 and 50: • Businesses, such as: - Tax plan
Page 51 and 52: According to the court of appeal, t
Page 53 and 54: loan prohibition, the Accounting Ac
Page 55 and 56: 4. It has a definite focus, though
Page 57: “A number of groups are engaged i
Page 60 and 61: Council and its task force have con
Page 62 and 63: Special joint consultation groups f
Page 64 and 65: 4. Intelligence and Monitoring Oper
Page 66 and 67: The total money involved in transac
Page 68 and 69: Intelligence Operations of Tax Crim
Page 70 and 71: Graph 13 Number of audits, 2000-200
Page 72 and 73: 2002 to 2003. The sums involved in
Page 74 and 75: Money Laundering, etc. A newly esta
Page 76 and 77: Since the project started on 1 Apri
Page 78 and 79: Manipulated cash registers are the
Page 80 and 81: professional criminals to one degre
Page 82 and 83: official figures. In the autumn of
Page 84 and 85:
ookkeeping offences continued to ac
Page 86 and 87:
Graph 25b Total number of reports o
Page 88 and 89:
Graph 26 Cases received, 1998-2003
Page 90 and 91:
Table 30 Number of decisions by EBM
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Graph 34 Average throughput time fo
Page 94 and 95:
6.5 TAX CRIME UNITS Expansion of ta
Page 96 and 97:
Graph 38 Trading prohibitions, 1998
Page 98 and 99:
9. Attachment, Collection, etc. The
Page 100 and 101:
Graph 43 Unpaid taxes and fees (SEK
Page 102 and 103:
Since a coordinated effort to recov
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According to the proposals, the age
Page 106 and 107:
and employers concerning registrati
Page 108 and 109:
suggest that attitudes are continui
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84 • a regional informational pro
Page 112 and 113:
12. International Contact and Coope
Page 114 and 115:
13. Skills and Methods Development
Page 116 and 117:
Since the autumn of 2002, EBM has c
Page 118 and 119:
nesses under their control, grant l
Page 120 and 121:
social insurance offices could prev
Page 122 and 123:
15 Problem Areas and Future Threats
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• higher unemployment • distort
Page 126 and 127:
15.3 UNDECLARED WORK IN CASH SECTOR
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EBM’s pilot project on measures f
Page 130 and 131:
15.5 AGENTS WHO AID ECONOMIC CRIME
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ied out indicate that most transact
Page 134 and 135:
Appendix 1 CHANGES PROPOSED BY SAME
Page 136 and 137:
SKV • SKV should have limited aut
Page 138 and 139:
Transport Workers’ Union VAT Info
Page 140:
Reported economic crimes have incre
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Economic crime report 2004 - Ekobrottsmyndigheten

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